Introduction to "In Conversation with Myself" by Julia Gjika

(We've just published the April 2011 edition of TWO LINES Online, our online version of our TWO LINES series of translation anthologies. To recognize the work we've gathered for TWO LINES Online, we've asked the translators to provide short introductions to the works. This first one comes from Ani Gjika, who has translated "In Conversation with Myself" by the Albanian poet Julia Gjika.)

There's a saying in Albania that goes, aty ku shkelin, nuk mbin bar, which means, "grass doesn't grow on trampled paths." I don't know how old the saying is, but it reflects the fate of a small nation in Eastern Europe that for centuries has struggled to maintain its identity and survive one occupation after another from powerful neighboring empires.

The nearly 450 years under the Ottoman empire did plenty to disintegrate Albania's language, culture, and traditions: for years the Albanian language was forbidden to be written, much less published, and it was only taught in schools after 1887. As if that were not enough, Albania became the most isolated country in Europe when Enver Hoxha came to power in 1944, succeeding in being, perhaps, the most effective totalitarian in the world for nearly 50 years. As a result, Albanian literature during most of the 20th century was practiced as a form of communist propaganda rather than as a source of artistic expression.

Julia Gjika is a contemporary Albanian poet who has lived and written in the United States since 1996. Gjika was born in 1949 and studied finance and Albanian literature. She belongs to the first generation of Albanian women poets, having published her first book Ditëlindje ("Birthday") in 1971, followed by Ku Gjej Poezinë ("Where I Find Poetry") in 1978. "In Conversation with Myself" is from her recent volume, Ëndrra e Kthimit ("The Dream of Return"), 2010.

Gjika's poetry is characterized by an unflinching honesty, a precision of thought and language, and the peculiar combination of wisdom with a childlike vulnerability. Her poetry reminds us not only of an immigrant's struggles in a new land but of an immigrant whose head is forever turned back toward a country that has been changing faster than she has been able to adapt to her new home. This split between the self that was and the new immigrant self is the predominant theme in her poetry of the last ten years and is most palpable in her poem "In Conversation with Myself."